Who knows what the future held for JL? He might have settled in as a sort of rock elder statesman by now. However, the folks who give those sorts of awards probably have a very long memory. I kinda doubt it.

No way the Queen would ever had allowed him to be knighted. The Royal Family took a lot of slack for giving The Beatles the MBE and then John slapped them in the face by returning it in a cheap publicity stunt for his record.

When he was murdered in 1980, no pop star had ever been knighted to my knowledge and since he was about to get back into public life...well, you just never know if knighthood was in his future.

I'm sure John would have been asked to participate in all of the "Aid" concerts and who knows what kind of charities he would have helped...possibly some of the Queen's charities would have gotten a hefty boost from the talents of an ex-Beatle.

If he'd have kept his former "attitude" towards authority figures, I'd say he probably would not have been knighted but let me assure everyone that with age comes much much more maturity towards the "establishment". Hell, you become the "establishment" whether you like it or not and the younger generation seems weird, strange and out of hand just like my generation seemed to my parents.

It is my opinion that John would have mellowed a great deal and would have seen what his fame could do for certain causes...I'd say he would have helped out and become an older and very wise senior citizen...He and Paul would have probably become much closer again, the Beatles would have recorded another album or two and the World would have been a different place...

You may say I'm a dreamer...But I'm not the only one.

In fact, I can just see John and Paul being Knighted at the same ceremony...at the same exact time...

p.s. I just turned 53 and I've been listening since the Fall of 1962 when I was a very impresssionable 8 year old...I can't possibly put into words how exciting it was to see The Fabs on the Ed Sullivan Show that Sunday night...February 9th, 1964...Life's been great !